The Elanor Garden

[primsong]

On a more positive note...

We had our annual spring clean-up for the Elanor garden in Beaverton on this past Saturday, and though the rainclouds rolled over us deep and dark, they gave us merely a sprinkle. The clover had spread its nefarious tendrils thoughout the groundcover and the dozen of us spent the morning and into the afternoon just weeding it and pulling up grass that was trying to choke the lavender. We were all quite grateful for Lalaith and Bekah providing us with a lovely and deliberately 'hobbity' luncheon out of their own generosity, and were able to tackle the remaining weeds, trimming, the tilling with the Reluctant Tiller that Would Not Start and our favorite part, the Planting of the Flowers.

And what flowers! Pansies and alyssum and several I don't know the names of... lavender and wildflower seeds and lots and lots of "Red Hobbit" columbine. The Elijah-blue Fescue and Sweet William are already there - all we need now is some of those Loth Lorien daffodils.

The day passed all too soon and darkness found us frantically flinging organic humus by the bucketful, the children running back and forth with their sand-buckets filled, the stiff adults shuffling along with wheelbarrow and rubbermaid bins. By the last of the fading light, the Endless Pile of Humus that Would Not Die finally found its demise and we swept the parking lot and sidewalks clean.

It looks lovely! We are planning on refinishing the deck this summer, and will also have a Fall clean-up. The benches need a new coating and gravel too. The newly made stepping stones will have their ceramic literature quote discs set into them once they are ready - thanks so much, Jeanine! - and it's a garden that Samwise would be proud of. He was in fact - sent each of us volunteers a letter that said he hoped to return one day and work in it again. (thank you, Sean!).

Elanor lives.

Comments

[primsong.livejournal.com]

So am I. We started out intending to stamp them all with quotes using letter stamps, but when we went to do it they just weren't readable. Ended up smoothing them out and pressing fern-fronds and an assortment of leaves into them for leafy impressions and making a circle in the center that the ceramic could be affixed to. They're various shades of dark cream, depending on which batch that we mixed was poured into which form. The ones that are there are plain grey cement and look very primative, like the words were drawn in them with someone's finger. :-/ This will be a nice upgrade.